#Edchat: Join the Conversation

Over 1000 educators have participated in #edchat discussions. Will you collaborate with us to create educational change?

Although relatively new, #edchat has become an incredible collaborative tool for educators to debate and evaluate solutions to various problems through Twitter. Over 1000 educators and administrators have contributed to the #edchat discussions from various countries around the world. In what other forum would this be possible?

Details, Details…

When does #edchat take place? Tuesday is a common Twitter day for teachers made popular by the #teachertuesday hashtag created by Aniya, @TheEngTeacher. To accommodate teachers in various time zones we have two edchat discussions which take place usually around 12pm NYT (EST) and 7pm NYT (EST).

How is #edchat different from #teachertuesday?#Edchat is the official discussion forum of #teachertuesday. However, each hashtag serves a different purpose. Here are some guidelines:

You should use #TeacherTuesday to recommend educators to follow, educational blogs, and links. Please visit this post to find out more information about #TeacherTuesday.

You should use #edchat for discussions between educators on thought-provoking topics. There are designated times for the larger discussions, but if you are already engaged in a lively discussion with 2 or more educators on a topic that would benefit educators, then feel free to use the hashtag.

What is a hashtag? Check out this video to discover what a hashtag is and how to use a hashtag. Every Tuesday, at the designated time, you only need to add “#edchat” to the end of your tweet to participate in the discussion!

How are Topics Chosen? Every Sunday, Tom Whitby, Steven Anderson, and I (ShellTerrell) create a twtpoll of 5 topics to choose from for Tuesday’s discussion. Just follow one of us or the #edchat tag so you do not miss your opportunity to vote on a topic. You may also propose topics to any of us by sending us a Tweet or DM!

Challenge:

Shelly Sanchez Terrell is a teacher trainer, instructional designer, adjunct professor, and the author of The 30 Goals Challenge for Teachers: Small Steps to Transform Your Teaching and Learning to Go: Lesson Ideas for Teaching with Mobile Devices, Cell Phones and BYOT. She has been recognized by the ELTon Awards, The New York Times, the Ministry of Education in Spain, and Microsoft’s Heroes for Education as an innovator in the movement of teacher-driven professional development and education technology. Recently, she was named Woman of the Year 2014 by Star Jone’s National Association of Professional Women and awarded a Bammy Award as a founder of #Edchat, the Twitter chat that spurred over 400 teacher chats. She has trained teachers and taught learners in over 25 countries and has consulted with organizations worldwide such as UNESCO Bangkok, The European Union aPLaNet Project, Cultura Iglesa of Brazil, the British Council in Tel Aviv, IATEFL Slovenia, HUPE Croatia, and VenTESOL. She shares regularly via TeacherRebootCamp.com, Twitter (@ShellTerrell), and Facebook.com/shellyterrell. Her greatest joy is being the mother of Rosco the pug.

Thanks for this, it helps see what is going on a little. (I actually think it’s an excellently informative blogpost) I followed (as a lurker) the edchat this evening, and found it slightly …aggressive, I think. (that’s not exactly the right word, but it’s the closest one I can find at this time of night). Partly because I’m uncomfortable with the word “admins” which suggests some shadowy Orwellian character who manipulate and control, while not allowing change, and partly because it seemed like there was an awful lot of generalisations about these “admins” who are seen as the problem. In 90% or more of cases I’ve encountered, “admins” are educators themselves, and I think demonising them as the tone of edchat seemed to do, is, I feel unhelpful, and not likely to effect any meaningful change.

It may just be my dislike of the word that causes half of this, and I realise there is a slight US/UK divided-by-common-language thing here.

Feel free to post these concerns in edchat! People often disagree and stick up for administrators. The goal is to infect change through discussion. Please feel free to add suggestions or note your observations, because this will only improve the edchat discussions. Thanks for dropping by and noting it here! We will be talking about other topics either than admin for future discussions.

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I tried following the edchat this past week and honestly found it to be counterproductive to any meaningful dialog. It felt like I was in a room with hundreds of other people who were all talking at the same time via fortune cookie platitudes. Maybe it is just me, but I’m having a hard time finding any constructive value in this. Maybe you can help me out with the point / purpose of the chat?

The purpose for edchat is to discuss, debate, and challenge various issues in education. Around the globe, educators gather from around the world to find ways to tackle these problems in their local schools. The educational systems around the world have tremendous problems, such as enormous achievement gaps that have lasted for decades and a lack of equal access to education for all. Educators are inspired by the weekly discussions to initiate change. Many of the educators have created nings, performed parent workshops, performed training, created group wikis, participated in interviews in their community, and other exciting projects which were inspired by Edchat. Edchat promotes the idea that through the collective collaboration of educators we do have the ability to establish real change!

@Shelly Terrell, The depth and pace of edchat is not for everyone, but it is anything but counterproductive. It affords educators the ability to voice their take on whatever topic was selected by the group. The pace and seemingly confusing number of chats can be mind boggling to a first time attendee.The fortune cookie flavor is a result of the Twitter format. It does force chatters to think out their point in order to get people to consider it in 140 characters. I personally find it a challenge.
I always thought the impact of Edchat was not in the chat itself at the time, but rather the next day or two after it was done. The edchat is used by many educational Bloggers to take the pulse of educators on a given topic. The result is that there are many references to edchat in more expanded examination of the topic on educational blogs throughout the internet.They use edchat comments as a guide to question and explore the topic. Many educators with large numbers of twitterers in their PLN’s get responses about and from edchat almost up until the next edchat topic is posted.People even use the edchat hashtag to post educational topics all week long.
I am always surprised at how many people contact me if the Topic poll is a little late, or if we haven’t entered a topic that some educators requested.
Since I have been with Edchat from the beginning I will admit that it has become not only bigger than I ever imagined, but it has also become very relevant in voicing and forming educators’ opinions and creating discussions on levels never before attainable without the scope of social media. Edchat’s importance and relevance may be fleeting as other social media tools replace Twitter, but the idea behind it should continue. Since it does promote the exchange of ideas and gives direction to those topics that concern educators it should to retain support. That is not counterproductive.

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